


Dusk Until

by thisismybrainrain



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Faith POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-15
Updated: 2015-11-15
Packaged: 2018-05-01 20:23:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5219570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisismybrainrain/pseuds/thisismybrainrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>faith broods whilst staking vamps solo. she reflects on buffy & her connections to those closest to her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. thoughts on B

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skeletonannie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skeletonannie/gifts).



and she burns like rum on the fire – hozier

She’d kissed the blood of your knuckles and spat the excess into dust from your weeping wounds the first time. You were fresh to this game then. Now look at you: out alone in some ruffled graveyard of Vienna.

This isn’t the first time you’ve got fucked up like this. B had always been there. Somewhere.

it was a bad day. It was the anniversary of the mayor’s death and as much as you tried to shut him out of your mind it was inescapable he would always be one of the first who treated you like your ideas were worth something more than just a shrug or a nod. He gave you his undivided attention and at sixteen that’s something you took seriously. 

Some decade later, the memories though faded still pierced you in your down moments. 

You’d been out the whole night dawn to dusk shift. Hipflasks stashed in your leather jacket and you knew B would find you. 

Didn’t she always?

/

You’d worshipped the ground she’d walked on ever since you first saw her.  
Even with that knife in your gut and the coma dreams washing over you. Now your belly throbbing only rarely when your were raw with the motions of slaying. 

You still wanted to place her on a throne and be nourished by her life at her feet and she wanted you to sit beside her. Were you ready? Was it dangerous? maybe.  
Did you love her? So much. 

The attack had been constant still, weeks after Carm and Buffy had been patrolling the vamps had crawled up from caverns of hell to find you

They met your bare fists and kicks sharp elbows and sharpened stakes and you felt alive as you bled with the fight. The buzz was something you’d never grow tired of. 

Of all the people in your life, Buffy understood this best. Apart from your rooftop bud, but, it was different with Buffy. Carm understood that. Buffy kept you light where she could but she let you be heavy when you needed to be and you sparred and you fought and you fucked and it was okay. It was the cycle of the slaying: eat, slay, fuck, sleep, repeat. It had been like that a lot recently and, with Buffy gone, you and spike had been revisiting some missed body swap fantasies of old and he was the champagne – putty like you knew he would be. 

 

Buffy hadn’t minded at all. Welcomed it in fact. His sharp cheekbones were rough against your chest and you drowned in him for a moment the previous night. You let him take you but you found your self missing her small hands and urgent mouth against you.

A vamp crumbled to dust. You shook our your hair and pulled your phone out.  
The silence was worrying you. But, it was okay. She was off somewhere with tiny ball of sunshine rage working. You tapped out the text:

Love you, B. x

-

What could you do? 

She’d made you soft but you welcomed the melt.


	2. Retreat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> faith cannot say it. she retreats to the roof and carm finds her.

erase myself and let go of what I’ve done – linkin’ park. 

 

You’re leaving her bedroom again. 

This is the second time within two weeks. 

You didn’t say it tonight. 

She’d fell into sleep before she caught the whisper. 

There’s a rooftop. 

Always: so many ways to stumble; so many ways to fall.

You always find yourself retreating to the places where she made you feel most vulnerable. 

You’re so gone and she was still sleeping. 

Her tan skin made your palms itch.

You blinked your eyes closed and her short blonde hair was so clear behind your eyelids.

The scar on your belly throbbed.

It had been a rough roll in the hay tonight. 

You were far from five by five and you needed a drink. 

You heard the door behind you creak open and the soft thud of boots. 

You smelt blood.

Carmilla.

She joined you on the edge. Sitting between the poles that made up the railing. 

She grinned at you. Fangs out. The stars were scattered just like your hammering heartbeat and B’s lipstick was still smeared behind your ear. Tiny bite marks chaffed against your longue trousers.

You wanted to reach behind and rub the lipstick off. 

You felt Carm nudge at your shoulder. ‘Hey, F.’

‘Hey, kid,’ you said and smiled small.

‘Rough night?’ she asked

‘Running away. The usual.’ You pulled a cigarette out of the packet in her jacket pocket and lit one. She was looking at the stars. You needed a nicotine hit. Stat. 

Your lungs were full of Buffy’s breaths and you needed to cleanse. 

 

It was suffocating you from the inside tonight. 

You loved and fucked and loved fucking and fucking loved her. The words hid themselves behind your teeth. Harnessed them to the flesh beneath your tongue. 

‘Kid, why is it so hard to say I love you?,’ you asked Carmilla. 

‘Because we love and we are afraid it’ll ruin us,’ she said, turning to you and stealing your cigarette to take a drag, ‘but in truth Faith, we find our strength when its right we find that. She’s making tea you know. She’s in the kitchen.’

You felt your shoulders tighten and your vision blur. You sat on the edge of panic till Carmilla’s hand smoothed circles into your ribbed vest and you felt it fade slowly. 

 

You had to find B. 

 

You had to tell her the three words tonight otherwise you’d lose your nerve, otherwise they’d fade into the back of your throat and be lost till the next time. 

 

She’d made you feel so open. 

 

Like she had mini crowbars in her palms and had unhinged you every time her fingers had skated across your shoulder. 

 

Making new maps of you. 

 

Making you her home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you cole.  
> you pass the torch. you light the fire of words.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you to the creators of these characters.  
> they are so important.


End file.
